or "heroine" at all. These artificial character-types being wholly to artificial plot-forms, have no place in serious fiction of any kind. The function of the story is to express a certain human mood of wonder and liberation, and any tawdry dragging-in of dime-novel theatricalism is both out of place and injurious. No stock romance is wanted. We must select only such characters (not necessarily stalwart or dashing or youthful or beautiful or picturesque characters) as would naturally be involved in the events to be depicted, and they must behave exactly as real persons would have if confronted with the given marvels. The tone of the whole thing must be realism, not romance.
The crucial and delicate matter of getting characters off the earth must be carefully managed. Indeed, it probably forms the greatest single problem of the story. The departure must be plausibly accounted for and impressively described. If the period is not prehistoric, it is better to have the means of departure a secret invention. The characters must react to this invention with a proper sense of utter, almost paralyzing wonder, avoiding the cheap fictional tendency of having such things half-taken for granted. To avoid errors in complex problems of physics, it is well not to attempt too much detail in describing the invention.
Scarcely less delicate is the problem of describing the voyage through space and the landing on another world. Here we must lay primary stress on the stupendous emotions--the unconquerable sense of astonishment--felt by the voyagers as they realize they are [[underline]]actually off their native earth[[end underline]], in cosmic gulfs on an alien world. Needless to say, a strict following of scientific fact in representing the mechanical, astronomical, and other aspects of the trip is absolutely essential. Not all readers are ignorant of the science, and a flagrant contravention of truth ruins a tale for anyone able to detect it.
Equal scientific care must be given to our representation of events on the alien planet. Everything must be in strict accord with the known or assumed nature of the orb in question--surface gravity, axial inclination, length of day and year, aspect of sky, etc. -- and the atmosphere must be built up with significant details of conducting to verisimilitude and realism. Hoary stock devices connected with the reception of the voyagers by the planet's inhabitants ought to be ruled rigidly out. Thus we should have no over-facile language learning; no telepathic communication; no worship of the travellers as deities; no participation in affairs of the pseudo-human kingdoms, or in conventional wars between factions of inhabitants; no weddings with beautiful anthropomorphic princesses; no stereotyped Armageddons with ray-guns and space-ships; no court intrigues and jealous magicians; no peril from hair ape-men of the polar caps; and so on, and so on. Social and political satire are always undesirable since such intellectual and ulterior objects detract from the story's power as a crystallisation of a mood. What must always be present in superlative degree is a deep, pervasive sense of [[underline]]strangeness[[end underline]]--the utter, incomprehensible [[underline]]strangeness[[end underline]] of a world holding nothing in common with ours.
It is not necessary that the alien planet be inhabited--or inhabited at the period of the voyage--at all. If it is, the denizens must be definitely non-human in aspect, mentality, emotions, and nomenclature, unless they are assumed to be descendants of a prehistoric colonising expedition from our earth. The human-like aspect, psychology, and proper names commonly attributed to other-planetarians by the bulk of cheap authors is at once hilarous and pathetic. Another absurd habit of conventional hacks is having the major denizens of the planets always more advanced scientifically and mechanically than ourselves; always indulging in spectacular rites against a background of cubistic temples and palaces, and always menaced by some monstrous and dramatic peril. This kind of pap should be replaced by an adult realism, with
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